Dr Hassan Rouhani looking set to win the Iranian presidential election

All the signs are that Dr Hassan Rouhani has won the Iranian presidential election.

It’s hard to be sure, but with some ten per cent plus of the results in, he is hovering just about the required 50 per cent to win outright on the first round.

One signal that this may indeed be the case is that the Mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibas, ordered all election posters to be taken down during the early hours of the morning, and as he is running second with a respectable number of votes behind Rouhani, he could have hoped to have been in any second round and would have wanted his posters to stay up. 

I have just been in Rouhani’s headquarters where there is a subdued whiff of victory and where one of his key lieutenants told me that they had been informed by some elements of government that their candidate has indeed secured 50 per cent plus.

But nothing is certain here until it is certain, and officially announced by the Ministry of the Interior. The streets are calm but busy and Rouhani’s supporters who one encounters with the tell-tale purple wrist band are extremely restrained in their joy.

Finally, if Rouhani it is, Iran will have voted for pragmatic change, but he was the only candidate offering it, so it is conceivably a game-changing moment both internationally and domestically. Sanctions being the very present backdrop to the desire for change.

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